The ice is thawing between Mayor Gavin Newsom and San Francisco 49ers team officials.

Newsom had a "very pleasant" meeting for about an hour Tuesday in City Hall with team President Jed York, who in December took over for his father, co-owner John York.

Officially, the team is still hoping to leave the city and build a new stadium in Santa Clara.

But the Tuesday meeting ended without the frustration that was common between Newsom and the elder York. And that could bode well for smoothing the relationship between the team and the city, which wants to the keep the Niners - ideally at a new waterfront stadium at the center of a huge Hunters Point redevelopment project.

A team spokeswoman said the meeting covered the city's lease obligations at the team's current home at Candlestick Park, short- and long-term options for remodeling that stadium and progress being made on the Hunters Point project.

"None of this changes the fact that the City of Santa Clara is our first choice," Niners spokeswoman Lisa Lang said.

Newsom suggested the meeting after Jed York told a gathering of 49ers season ticket holders Feb. 16 that there hadn't been "great cooperation" with the mayor. York also said the city's plan to have a new $900 million-plus stadium at Hunters Point was dubious in the current recession because transportation infrastructure was "based on selling 10,000 condos."

Newsom the next day called York to say that was not the case and offered to meet, an aide said. The development deal will require the completion of the necessary infrastructure "regardless of whether a single home is sold," Newsom wrote in a letter to York.

The letter went on to say that the city had addressed almost every concern the 49ers had about the Hunters Point site, including the pace of hazardous material cleanup at the former naval shipyard.

York, though, told the season ticket holders that he's hopeful a deal with Santa Clara can be worked out by the end of the month and the $916 million stadium project could go before voters there in November.